Why focus sustainability efforts in product development?

The product development process is considered a critical business process to increase the competitiveness of companies. Similarly, it is critical for the improvement of the sustainability performance of products. Companies are increasingly recognizing that there are several opportunities for incorporating sustainability into product development, in order to increase the value to stakeholders and society.

The biggest opportunities for improving the sustainability performance of a product are in the early stages of the product development process, in which the degrees of freedom in the establishment of product characteristics are higher.

Recent studies show that ca. 80% of the sustainability performance of a product is fixed in the early stages of product development, when decisions regarding product performance, target market, use of materials, manufacturing processes, supply chain and stakeholders, distribution channels, maintenance and related services, etc. are defined.

As the features and product details are being determined, the degrees of freedom decrease gradually. In the final stages of the process, the design possibilities for change are minor due to the large number of decisions that were made previously in the process. At this point, the options are limited to the environmental improvement of production processes, logistics, recycling, etc.

The incorporation of sustainability into product development is characterized by a holistic view that expands the scope of sustainability considerations beyond production processes to the entire life cycle of the products, from raw material extraction and manufacturing to use and end-of-life. Life cycle thinking enables the transition towards circular economy.

A company that manages the product development properly and in a structured manner has a greater probability of being successful when integrating sustainability in product development: most of the factors that foster the successful integration of sustainability in product development process are the same factors that are recognized as essential to the success of product development itself.

Moreover, the success of integrating environmental aspects into product design and development in an organization is enhanced by the involvement of relevant disciplines and organizational functions such as design, engineering, marketing, environment, quality, purchasing, service delivery, etc. The interface among product development and the related processes, such as strategic planning, research & development and purchasing, play a crucial role in the definition of the sustainability performance of a product.

The integration of sustainability into business and product development has, therefore, a strong potential to increase the sustainability performance of products across their entire life cycle, making good business sense and enabling a positive impact in the society.